


A Joker's Not Even A Real Playing Card Anyway

by shadedScribe



Category: Batman - All Media Types, Homestuck
Genre: Brief References to Torture, Can you believe that this was supposed to be a drabble?, Crossover, Gen, Gratuitous shifting between second and third person POV, Post-main canon for Homestuck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-07
Updated: 2020-02-07
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:54:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22594357
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shadedScribe/pseuds/shadedScribe
Summary: There's a new gang in Gotham, one that appeared out of nowhere. They're strange, they're dangerous, and they're violently shaking up the underworld. The Batfamily has their work cut out for them trying to get to the bottom of things. Who are these people, and what could possibly be motivating their actions?---Your name is Spades Slick, and have you mentioned lately how you hate clowns?
Comments: 15
Kudos: 131





	A Joker's Not Even A Real Playing Card Anyway

**Author's Note:**

> Me, writing something for the Homestuck fantasy AU I'm working on: Haha, Slick is so fun to write. I'm gonna write a little something real quick about this crossover idea I had where the Midnight Crew winds up in Gotham.
> 
> Also me: It's going to wind up being 10k, take a week to write, have a couple of really involved actions scenes, and I'm going to test out some ideas I had for writing Cass's point of view.
> 
> FML. Oh, well, I'd rather be a misdirected wellspring than be dried up with writer's block.

Your name is Spades Slick, and you’re not entirely sure what the hell is happening to you right now. Last thing you remember, you were fighting a buncha teenagers with swords and that asshole with the glowy eyes and the crowbar. But now, you’re spiraling through blackness. It feels disconcertingly like the cross between going down a water slide and walking through a really heavy snowstorm.

It’s also a real big pain in the ass, is what it is. You feel like you’re going somewhere. You wish that whatever bullshit was running this show would get a move on with it.

As if something had heard you, you find yourself dropped unceremoniously in a back alley somewhere. 

Where the hell are you? This doesn’t look like any of those planets you saw on your revenge quest. It’s not Derse or that old moon you used to live on either. At least it looks alright. A real proper grim kinda aesthetic this place has.

You check yourself over as you look around. You lost that fancy cuestaff at some point, but the rest of you seems to be intact, robot bits and all. Most importantly, your hat is still firmly in place on your head.

There’s a sound in the alley next to you. You whip out a knife and look to see who it is. 

It’s three other people, dressed in serviceable coats and hats that aren’t quite as nice as yours. Well, well, well. It’s your old gang, the Midnight Crew. You haven’t seen any of them since you broke open that big-ass safe with the time bits attached and probably killed them all.

You ask them what the hell they’re doing here. Droog says he was going to ask you the same thing. Apparently Sgrub or Sburb or whatever the hell it’s really called chewed you up and spit you out. At least it had the decency to spit you somewhere decent. 

The rest of your crew all seem to be fine, so you tell them to stop lollygagging and get a move on. There’s a whole city that looks appealingly crime-infested to get to work on. Time to hit the town.

As the four of you pile out of the alley, you catch sight of an old newspaper that tells you the name of the town. Gotham City. Nice ring to it.

\----------------

Stephanie followed Tim over the rooftops into a neighborhood filled with shops. It was weird being out in the day, even if the season and the smog conspired to give four in the afternoon a decidedly dim kind of look.

“What are we checking out again?” she asked.

“Candy store robbery.” Tim answered. “A few people broke in last night, stole a few bags of candy. No one was hurt.”

Steph was puzzled. “Isn’t that a little below our paygrade?”

“Yeah, but it’s a whimsical crime, which in this town means it might be a prelude to something way more serious.” Tim pointed out.

“Oh, right.”

“Plus, I was listening in on the police scanner, and apparently the owner was talking about how the robbers were really weird.”

“Hoo boy.”

“Exactly.”

The two of them landed in front of the shop in question. The door was still hanging off of its hinges, but Tim politely knocked anyway before coming in.

The owner looked up from where he was sweeping.

“Red Robin! Spoiler!”

“Sorry to intrude,” said Tim, “but I was wondering if we could maybe ask you a few questions about the robbery.”

“Oh, sure.” The man straightened up and leaned on his broom. “It was at about ten-thirty last night. These four guys kicked in the door while I was closing up and made me give them a bunch of candy. Licorice mostly, but they also took all of the wax lips. They didn’t show any weapons, but I still got the impression that they weren’t exactly asking. Plus they were big, and weird.”

“They didn’t take any money?” Steph asked.

“Didn’t even ask. Seemed like they were in a hurry. Honestly, if they hadn’t got all this glass everywhere I wouldn’t even be that bothered.”

“You said they were weird.” Tim cut in. “Weird how?”

“They were all black, and not like, a black guy black. They were coal black, and their proportions were all wrong. They almost looked like they had shells instead of skin or something, and I swear that one of them had a robot arm. And they all talked like they were from the frickin 1930s or something. Dressed like it too.” The shop owner paused for a moment. “Though I have to admit, the hats were nice.”

“Right.” Tim nodded. “Thank you for your time. We’ll be sure to swing around a couple of times on tonight’s patrol, in case anything else happens.”

“Thanks. You kids stay safe out there.”

“We’ll do our best.”

The two of them popped up to the nearby rooftops to discuss it.

“You were right.” Steph said. “That did sound weird as hell.”

“Maybe it was just some rambunctious teenagers who went the extra mile to disguise themselves, but somehow I doubt it.” Tim sighed.

“Well, it was a pretty small time crime, so hopefully nothing will really come of it.” said Steph, knuckles rapping against a nearby sign.

Tim raised an eyebrow. “You think knocking on wood is going to help?”

“Worth a shot.”

“Signal to everyone.” Duke’s voice cut in over the communicator. “I just happened to find where Killer Croc was hiding. He’s fleeing through the sewers up Fourth Street. I could use a hand.”

“Keep on him, Spoiler and I will cut him off.” Tim leapt off the roof, grappling hook already in hand. Stephanie followed. Weird candy store robberies could wait, they had more important work to do.

\----------------

Your name is Spades Slick, and you’re starting to like this town. It’s lively. Lots to do. Nice and dark. Plenty of interesting customers, and the flatfoots are all so pathetic that they let a bunch of freakshows who dress up like flying rats do half of the work for them. It’s a pretty good town to be a gangster in.

Of course, you and your compatriots have some work to do, if you want people to start treating you with the respect you deserve. Time to make a name for yourselves.

You decide to start with a casino. Every self-respecting criminal organization needs a casino to run things out of. And there’s no shortage of casinos in this town. They’re all run by other folks, but you know how to fix that.

You and your associates walk into one of the nicer casinos in town that night and ask to see the manager. Once you’ve been ushered into the upstairs office by some very serious gentlemen, you inform them that this is your casino now. They all seem to think that it’s very funny. The disrespect you get, you swear.

A little judicious application of violence by you and your subordinates later, the goons that are left are taking you more seriously. One of them is going on about some guy who he works for, and how you’re all going to pay. You ignore him. After getting ahold of the keys to everything, you kick out the other guys and send Droog out to inform the staff about the new ownership and clean up the bureaucrat shit.

Once that’s done, you celebrate by having a few rounds of cards with the crew. Just like old times. It’s a nice casino. It’ll be a good start.

\----------------

Tim, finished with his patrol for the night, parked his motorcycle in the Batcave and climbed up to the main area to check on the Batcomputer. Bruce was already waiting in the seat, looking over an online news article with an expression of grim concern on his face.

Of course, that didn’t do much to narrow down what Bruce might be looking at, since that was an awfully common expression on his face.

Tim looked over what Bruce what reading. It was a breaking news article about a shootout that had taken place in a warehouse over on the west side of town, away from where Tim had been earlier. 

“Aw, man.” Tim went to put his motorcycle helmet back on, but Bruce stopped him.

“The situation has already been resolved. Batgirl was on the scene. But the reports are disturbing, and there might be something bigger going on. We need to plan. But first, Spoiler mentioned a strange robbery the two of you looked into yesterday that might be related.”

“I knew that was going to be trouble.” Tim sighed, before filling Bruce in on the limited details.

By the time he was finished, everyone else had gathered. Cass was sitting by the meeting table while Alfred bandaged up a shallow cut in her arm, Stephanie cheerfully chatting with her. Damian was sharpening a batarang, while Duke read over the same news article that Bruce had been looking at earlier. That was everyone right now: this apparently wasn’t important enough to get Jason in special for, Dick was off in space with the Titans, and Barbara was off in Brazil with Black Canary blurring the line between a Birds of Prey mission and a romantic getaway.

“Everyone.” Bruce started politely as he sat down. They all turned to pay attention to him.

“A situation has developed. Last night, four individuals matching the description from a bizarre candy store robbery Red Robin and Spoiler investigated previously-”

“I knew that was gonna be trouble.” Steph muttered.

“-walked into the Wild Hearts casino, owned by Sal Maroni. After killing several of his men, they evicted the rest and declared themselves the new owners. Maroni’s response to their assault led to the shootout on the west side tonight, where several more of Maroni’s men were killed, including one of his lieutenants. We need to get a handle on this before it gets out of control.”

“I wasn’t aware that it was so easy to gain possession of an enterprise, even in this city.” said Alfred.

“Maroni owned the casino through a subordinate, and several persons were presumably threatened into turning over the appropriate paperwork. But since no one can prove that the handover wasn’t voluntary, they’re legally in the clear, not to mention the change that the change in ownership isn’t public knowledge and these new people aren’t officially on any paperwork.”

Petty theft to grand larceny and murder. That was quite a jump.

“Do we have any more details about them?” Tim asked.

“Witness accounts have been brief and inconsistent, though they do match what you and Spoiler found out earlier. However, Batgirl encountered them in person tonight. Any observations?” Bruce turned to Cass with that last bit. She looked thoughtful for a moment before answering.

“They are very strange-looking. They do seem to have shells rather than skin, and some of their proportions are bizarre. The biggest one was nearly two and a half meters tall, while the smallest was barely a meter. And their movements were… strange. Plus the pointy teeth. I don’t think they’re human, or if they were, then something very weird happened to them.”

“Hm.” Bruce looked even more grimly concerned at that.

“Whatever they are,” Cass continued, “they’re dangerous. They work reasonably well together. I think the leader is the midsize one with the fedora. And the knives.”

She flexed her bandaged arm.

“No formal training that I saw, but they have lots of weapons, and they know what they’re doing.”

“Alright then.” Bruce stood up. “We’re going to get a handle on this before things can escalate too much. Tomorrow, we’ll all hit the streets and find out everything we can about these people, and at night, we’ll follow their operations and try to catch them and Maroni’s men together the next time they clash. Batgirl, how’s your arm?”

“Fine.”

“Good. Everyone go and get some sleep. We’ve got work ahead of us.”

\-------------------

Your name is Spades Slick, and you think there’s nothing like a good old-fashioned gang war to get the blood flowing. This Maroni guy apparently took it personally when you swiped his casino. You can relate, of course, but business is business. You were going to have to mess some people up to establish a reputation anyway. May as well be these guys.

Of course, you also might have to take these bat-weirdos a bit more seriously if they try and get in the way, at least if that spooky-looking dame with the mask is any indication. You coulda sworn you had her, but she was pretty quick. Good punch, too. Droog was still spitting out blood, since an uppercut was a bitch when you had pointed teeth. But you all got away fine.

Now you’ve got everyone heading out and laying some spondulicks around to find out where Maroni might be hiding out. You’re waiting for them to report back.

Your associates return with some news. They’ve found some kinda skyscraper that Maroni and his goons use as a home base in the city. You tell them to get ready, and tell Deuce to dig out some explosives, because tonight you’re going to go pay them a little social call.

\--------------

Damian peered across the street at the penthouse that Sal Maroni used as a base. Earlier that day, everyone’s intelligence gathering efforts had found out some limited information. Between their efforts, they had learned some names at least. The strange foursome called themselves the Midnight Crew; the big one was called Boxcars, the little one was Deuce, the serious one was Droog, and the one with the knives and fedora, who was indeed the leader, was Slick. They had recently procured a very large stockpile of weapons, of all sorts. In a little stroke of luck, Drake had also caught up with a lowlife about fifteen minutes after said lowlife had taken a couple hundred bucks to tell the Midnight Crew where Sal Maroni’s penthouse was. And so, here they were on stakeout. Tim, Stephanie, and Cassandra were on the other side of the building, watching the rear entrance. Damien was in front, perched on a gargoyle next to Bruce, while Duke looked everything over with those eyes of his.

“Building’s mostly empty.” he reported. “No one in there but Maroni and his men. There’s some janitors and late workers in the adjacent buildings though.”

“Nobody else in the building?” said Damian. “Is it some kind of trap?”

“Possibly, but not necessarily.” Tim’s voice crackled in Damian’s earpiece. “This building is one of those ‘empty apartment building as a real estate investment’ sort of things. There aren’t any other residents.”

“Maroni’s goons are definitely on alert, but they don’t seem to be expecting anyone in particular.” said Duke.

“Stay alert.” said Batman. “There’s most likely going to be trouble. Bunker down and report anything of interest.”

They settled down into the strained tedium of a stakeout, punctuated only by the occasional comment, mostly Duke pointing out security features or calling out movement patterns. He was an excellent stakeout partner.

About an hour and a half of waiting later, Duke suddenly sat up straighter.

“They’re here.” he said. “Just the four of them, on foot, coming out of the subway maintenance tunnels in the alley.”

“I see them.” Tim confirmed. “Looks like they’re splitting up. Deuce is making for the front entrance, Boxcars and Droog are climbing the fire escape, and Slick is-”

There was a roar and a glow, and Slick jetted up into the night sky on what appeared to be a rocket-propelled ass. That was new.

A brief scream echoed in the night, quickly choked off. So much for the roof guard.

“Let’s move.” snapped Batman. “Batgirl, Signal, get to the roof and chase down Slick. Robin, get Deuce. Spoiler, Red Robin, go after the main group, I’ll join you. Go!”

They burst into action as gunshots started to pepper the air. Damian slid neatly down a grappling line to land by the front entrance. Deuce was already there, hiding behind a decorative tree and taking potshots at the guards with a handgun.

“Look, it’s Robin!” called one of the guards.

Almost immediately, they all started shooting at him instead of the dangerous criminal who was presumably there to kill their boss. Idiots.

Damian went into action, dodging shots and flinging batarangs. Most of the guards lost their weapons in a hurry, and a quick smoke bomb took the rest of the guns out of the picture. One of the bigger goons just tried to rush Damian like an American football player, but he just sidestepped, kicked the back of his knee out, and landed a palm strike to his temple. The others ran in, but Damian slipped into the smoke cloud and picked them off one by one while they flailed. Of course, in all of the commotion, Deuce had slipped inside and was up to who knows what. The last guard slumped unconscious against the doorframe, and Damian ran inside.

He caught up with Deuce as the little man was making his way back up the basement stairs. The gangster managed to get off two wild shots before Damian got close enough to kick him over the railing back downstairs. What had he been doing down there, anyway? Damian peered down to look, careful not to put himself in the line of fire from Deuce’s gun.

Well. That was just a frankly ludicrous quantity of plastic explosives. The system was rigged up to a series of timebombs as triggers, and you would have to be a Flash to defuse them all in time.

Damian sprinted back out to the front entrance, yelling into his communicator as he went.

“The building’s rigged to blow! Clear out, now!”

The others gave a series of acknowledgements as Damian started dragging unconscious guards out of the blast radius. There was a commotion in the side alley as Maroni and a few goons, looking rather harried, rushed out of the side door to a car and took off, a few stray gunshots forcing Damian to take cover before he could do anything about it. Boxcars and Droog followed down the fire escape. The two were suddenly cut off when Stephanie dove out of a window and tackled Droog, the two of them rolling about on the ground as she tried to pin him and he tried to get a hand free to club her with something. Boxcars moved to intervene, but Tim burst out the door and landed a picture-perfect kick to his chest, which had about the same effect as if he had kicked a wall, but at least it distracted him.

Boxcars suddenly pulled an enormous battleaxe from out of nowhere and started trying to cut Tim in half. 

“Flash out!” Damian called over the comms, as he threw one. Both of the gangsters were dazed by the sudden light; Tim took the opportunity to wrap Boxcars up in a bolas, while Stephanie managed to get both of Droog’s arms behind his back and pin him to the ground. Unfortunately, Droog just jerked his head back and smashed Steph in the face with his skull, while Boxcars snapped the bolas cord like it was made of tissue paper. Great.

There was another roar of rockets as Slick jetted out from one of the higher stories, Cassandra trailing behind him, clinging to a cable wrapped around his ankle. Slick tried a few aerial maneuvers to shake her off before giving up, pulling a sword out of nowhere, and cutting the cable. Cass pulled out another grapple and caught one of the neighboring buildings before she could fall, while Slick jetted towards where Stephanie and Droog were now having a proper fistfight, sword upraised. Damian and Cass both took a shot at him with a batarang; he parried Damian’s, but Cass’s knocked the blade from his hand a moment before Stephanie almost got the closest haircut of her life.

There was a squeal of tires and a beeping horn. Deuce had slipped out of the building in the commotion and stolen a car, and was driving at breakneck pace towards his comrades. He tried to drift to a stop right next to them, but went too far, forcing Tim to vault over the hood and knocking Boxcars into a pile of trash. As Slick held Stephanie at bay with wild swings of his knife, Droog grabbed Deuce by the collar and unceremoniously flung him into the backseat, then took the wheel. Boxcars and Slick dove in, and the four drove off at top speed in the same direction as Moroni had gone, Deuce and Boxcars randomly shooting out of the back to discourage pursuit.

Batman and Signal glided in to land by Damian, carrying more unconscious guards.

“This is everyone who was still alive inside.” said Signal.

“Right.” Bruce looked down the street where the Midnight Crew had gone. “Let’s-”

The bombs went. There was a massive boom and a shockwave that felt like a shove, but surprisingly little shrapnel; apparently the charges had been shaped to make sure the blast got the interior.

“Uh, guys…” Duke pointed to the building. It was swaying dangerously, threatening to collapse and take the neighboring office building with it.

“We need to evacuate that building.” Batman snapped, already running in. “Signal, coordinate us.”

“Right.” Duke looked again with those eyes of his. “There’s a janitor on the thirty-seventh floor, and another on the fortieth, and if one of you can get to the intercom on the front desk…”

Fifteen frantic minutes later, the damaged building collapsed onto an empty skyscraper. By then the emergency services had shown up and taken over the situation.

Duke was standing a ways off, head in hands.

“I just don’t understand how I could have missed all of those explosives.” he was saying. “I know he didn’t have them when they first showed up.”

Cassandra put a comforting hand on his shoulder.

“Not your fault.”

“Yeah, what Batgirl said.” said Tim. “They were pulling all sorts of things out of thin air. I think they must have some kind of advanced tech on their side.”

“Red Robin’s right.” said Bruce. “They were clearly more capable than we were prepared for. Not to mention that your abilities helped us save a lot of lives in the neighboring building. Don’t beat yourself up.”

Duke smiled at that.

“Anything?” Bruce asked Stephanie, who was listening in on the police radio.

“No, not- wait, yeah, here.” She turned up the volume.

“-peat, all units, multiple gunshots reported at 311 West Shelly, send backup.”

“Isn’t that one of the places we were looking at for maybe being a mob bolthole?” Tim asked.

“Let’s move.” said Bruce, already running.

Unfortunately, the action was over by the time they arrived. There were just a few police cruisers outside, the officers keeping out bystanders and setting up crime scene tape. Detective Bullock waved them in.

“You’re late. Take a look at this.”

Damian looked around as they walked up to the front door. The car the Midnight Crew had stolen had been driven straight through the garage door and abandoned. Various goons lay dead from all sorts of violence; one even looked like some huge animal had bitten his head off.

And at the center of it all, with his throat cut, lay Sal Maroni.

“On the bright side,” said Bullock, “couldn’ta happened to a nicer guy.”

Bruce had been sweeping the car for DNA samples, and came back with a few.

“Maroni might have been scum, but he still deserved a trial, and his death is going to cause a lot of trouble for everyone.” he pointed out.

“Yeah, yeah, you don’t have to tell me. Just tryna look on the bright side here.”

Damian wasn’t feeling terribly inclined towards optimism right now. They had failed, and who knew what the Midnight Crew might get up to next?

\------------------

Your name is Spades Slick, and you’re feeling pretty good about your life. Now that you’ve whacked that Maroni guy, people are starting to show you the proper respect around here. Plus Boxcars yoinked the safes at all of Maroni’s hideouts, so you’ve managed to take over most of his stuff. Guy had his beak dipped in a lot of things. You’ve sold off a lot of the boring white collar shit though. Not your style. Gambling, smuggling, bootlegging, whacking people, occasional robbery; that’s more your speed. You’ve been getting hideouts made more to your liking, and you’re giving your casino a makeover to suit your gang, too.

Of course, now that you’ve knocked off one of the top guys in this town, and everyone is scrambling for a piece of the leftovers, you’ve gotta deal with the rest of them. You’ve figured out that there are about three major players in this town. There’s also a buncha other boring mob types like Maroni, but you’re not worried about them. It’s the Penguin, the Red Hood, and the Black Mask you’ve gotta worry about.

You meet up with the Penguin first. Some of the turf that you jacked from Maroni had been disputed territory, and in the chaos, the Penguin had tried to grab some of it. You had gone to teach his boys a lesson, but they had decided not to push it when you showed up. Apparently they didn’t want to pick a fight without knowing what they were getting into. That was the mark of a smart operator. You can maybe work with that.

And so, you and the crew show up to the Iceberg Lounge at eight in the evening, and you ask for a meeting. It’s a classy joint, you’ve gotta say.

You get ushered in to meet with the boss in short order. No one’s dumb enough to try and frisk you for weapons.

The Penguin asks you what he owes the pleasure of this visit to. You tell him that you’ve come up with a good way to settle the issue of the disputed turf, and reach into your pocket. Everyone tenses, but you just pull out a deck of cards. A regular one, even, not some kind of weapon-object duality shit.

You tell the Penguin that you’re always up for a good high-stakes card game. He takes a moment before he laughs and tells his goons to get a table.

The two of you settle it over a couple of hours of playing. You both cheat each other blind, of course, but it balances out, and you reach an agreeable settlement. You tell the Penguin as you leave that he’s welcome to try his luck against you at your casino any time. He seems to take that as a perfectly good peace gesture.

Dealing with the next big name starts a few days later. You’ve just come back from getting in a shipment of smuggled guns, and you’re nursing some bruises, since the bat-types tried to bust it up. You’ve gotta admit, those guys are legitimate. Lucky for the rest of this town, since the cops are softer than a Prospitian creampuff.

You’re already feeling a little irritable on account of the bats when you go to check on your spare wardrobe and find some sleazy-lookin’ little guy trying to stitch some circuitry junk in one of your spare hats. That pisses you right the hell off. Nobody messes with the hats.

A few beatings later, the guy is blubbering like a baby and begging you to let him go. You tell him you’ll let him go if he tells you what he was up to and who hired him. Apparently Black Mask hired this guy to put some kind of mind control nonsense in your hats for him. Lowdown dirty son of a bitch. You’ll have to find Black Mask and let him know that you don’t appreciate this sort of shit.

You let the sleazy guy go. Headfirst, off of the sixth floor balcony. Teach him to mess with a fella’s hats.

\----------------

Cassandra flexed her fingers impatiently as she sat in the back seat of the Batmobile, speeding towards the shootout currently taking place at the docks between Black Mask’s gang and the Midnight Crew. Bruce was driving, his usual grim-braced-ready self. Damian was in the front seat, irritated-determined-ready. Steph was sitting next to her, trying very hard not to show the angry-scared-hurt that she always felt whenever Black Mask came up, and to be fair, most people who hadn’t been obsessively trained in body language would never have noticed. There was an undercurrent of stress running through everyone too; she could even see it in Tim and Duke riding their motorcycles alongside the car. The last week had been rough.

The sudden death of Sal Maroni had created an enormous hole in Gotham’s underworld power structure, and any help that the Midnight Crew might have provided by taking over his stuff had been negated when they had cut a bunch of his more profitable white collar operations loose in favor of collecting a big lump of cash right away, leading to a huge fight as people tried to grab them. 

Bruce in particular was stressing about what they might need that much liquid money for. It was another worry compounding the fears he had about the new gang which had shown up out of nowhere and started shaking the whole town up. The DNA samples taken from the night of Maroni’s death had proven that the Midnight Crew weren’t human, or any other species of alien that anyone knew of. Bruce had even asked around with the Lanterns, and turned up nothing. They still hadn’t figured out how they could pull things out of nowhere either.

And then to top it all off, the Mad Hatter had “got drunk and fell off the balcony, I swear, terrible accident, I’d show you the footage but I’m afraid the cameras on that floor were down for maintenance.” And apparently he had been doing something for Black Mask, because now he and the Midnight Crew were at each other’s throats. And that had led to the shootout that was going on tonight, since the Midnight Crew’s approach to problem solving was apparently always to kick down the problem’s front door and try to murder it. 

They were going to try and catch everyone again, though they were prioritizing Black Mask, since the Midnight Crew had at least confined their violence to other violent criminals so far. Cass wanted to be there already. She hated waiting while things needed doing.

After what felt like an eternity but was actually a fairly short trip thanks to reckless disregard for traffic laws, they arrived. Adrenaline-eager-combativeness made its way into everyone’s body language as they left the vehicles and split into pairs. Bruce and Damian were going to wade right into the thick of things and get everyone to bolt, while Tim and Duke stopped people from escaping by land and Steph and Cass made sure no one got to a boat. Hopefully they’d catch more people this time.

The air crackled with gunshots, and as she and Steph made their way around towards the water there was an explosion that took out the roof of a nearby warehouse. At least there were no civilians around for them to have to evacuate this time.

There were a few stray guards posted around the side that started shooting at them. Steph took cover, while Cass just kept going; the guards’ eyes and arms told her where they were aiming as surely as if they had laser pointers attached to their guns. She effortlessly dodged their fire, while Steph popped out to sling batarangs at them while they were distracted. Soon everyone was disarmed, and the two girls made short work of them.

They made their way inside, rounding up a few stray criminals as they went. Most of them were in full panic-terror-cowering mode, which meant Batman and Robin were doing their usual work. They didn’t put up much of a fight. Cass was about to suggest that they move further in to try and catch some more, when Black Mask came running into the warehouse they had started gathering people in. He was alone, turning and firing behind him, body all snarled up with cornered-vicious-furious as he saw the two Bats and darted up the stairs away from them. A bullet cracked narrowly past his head as he went; Slick had followed him in, taking cover behind a crate as they exchanged fire. 

Steph and Cass shared a brief nod of acknowledgement before splitting up. Steph grappled up to the catwalk to cut off Black Mask, while Cass charged in at Slick. The alien man was hard to read, but she was starting to get the hang of it, weaving around three shots before her batarang sent Slick’s gun clattering to the floor.

Slick yanked a knife from nowhere and took a vicious overhand swing at her; she sidestepped and kicked at his head, but he leaned away. He kept attacking, stabs and cuts flurrying viciously while she batted at his wrists and forearms to redirect and disarm. She knocked three separate knives from his grasp, but he kept pulling more out of nowhere, and he was good with them, and his robotic arm made his attacks punishing even when you blocked them, not to mention that he kept managing to land little cuts on her arms just by being twirly with the blades. Cass read in his movements that he was expecting to have a longer reach in a second, and twisted away just in time for the full-length sword Slick suddenly produced to leave a shallow cut along her ribs instead of spitting her through the lung. He overreached a bit on the attack, and Cass landed a hard left jab on his head, followed up with a kick to where the solar plexus would have been on a human. Unfortunately, that spot didn’t seem to be anything special on whatever Slick was, and it just knocked him back a step and made him swear angrily. 

Up on the catwalk, there was a thud and twanging sound. Steph had successfully wrapped Black Mask’s arm to the railing with a weighted cable. Slick seemed to consider that for a second before whipping a knife at Steph and making a beeline for the window with his rockets. Cass easily knocked the knife out of the air, but that lost her any chance of getting Slick with a cable before he could get away. 

Cass ran upstairs to where Steph was catching her breath a little ways away from the trapped Black Mask, triumph and anger at war in her body language. Black Mask had a stab wound in his shoulder and a bullet graze on his side from earlier, Cass saw now that she was looking at him more closely. The man was leaning heavily against the railing, keeping the front of his body out of their view.

“Alright, alright,” he panted dramatically, “I surren-”

Cass and Steph’s batarangs both knocked away the extra gun he slipped out of his jacket before he could even turn around.

“Dammit.” he muttered.

Cass grabbed him by the collar and slammed him to the floor, cutting the line trapping his arm and replacing it with a pair of handcuffs.

“You Bats can’t even let a man have a shootout in peace?” he griped as he was frogmarched down the stairs.

“Oh, shut up.” said Steph. Cass could see the tension in her body language, and apparently so could Black Mask.

“Aw, what’s the matter, Blondie? Holding a grudge? Honestly, you jab a drill in someone one time-”

Cass didn’t even bother looking at him as she knocked him unconscious. Steph seemed a little more at ease after that.

“Thanks.” she said.

“Don’t mention it.”

They dragged him around to the front of the building, where a standoff was taking place. The Midnight Crew, minus Slick, was backed up against a car. Droog was waving around a machine gun while Deuce held up a bomb, and those were the only two things keeping the Bats at bay. The rest of Black Mask’s men were down or dead. Bruce and Damian were in cover waiting for a chance to try and disarm the enemy. Tim was waiting on his motorcycle in case they tried to run for it. Duke was nowhere to be seen, which meant he was probably sneaking up on them invisibly. It was a standoff, but once Duke got in there or someone slipped up, the three gangsters were definitely going to be captured.

There was a roar of rockets in the night sky as Slick swooped back into the fray, carrying a length of cable he had swiped from somewhere on the docks. He blew past the standoff, letting the line trail past his comrades, who grabbed on and hung on tight as they soared off into the night sky, Droog batting away the batarangs that were flung at them while Slick swore at his subordinates for being heavy. They had gotten away again.

On the bright side, though, there hadn’t been any disasters like at Maroni’s penthouse, and they had caught Black Mask at least.

“Hey!” Steph had pulled her cape aside to look at the cut on her ribs. “You’re bleeding.”

“It’s fine.”

“Are you sure? We should get you back to the cave and patch you up.” Concern laced her voice and her movements as she checked the cuts on Cass’s arms. It was sweet of her.

“We’ll all get back to base once the police arrive to take Black Mask and his men into custody.” said Bruce. Cass could already hear the sirens approaching.

“But we can still get them.” Damian argued. “If we just go to that casino of theirs, we can set up an ambush or something.”

“The only way we’ll be able to get any charges to stick is if we catch them at a crime scene.” Bruce answered. “Ever since Penguin helped get those judges who oppose taking evidence from vigilantes elected, it’s become difficult to assemble successful criminal cases. We’ll get our chance later.”

“Yeah, and at least we got Black Mask off the streets for a while.” Tim pointed out.

“Until his lawyers pull some more bullshit and get him sprung.” Steph muttered bitterly.

“You all did good tonight.” Bruce concluded as the police vans started pulling up. “Next time, we’ll pull it off.”

The next morning, Cass got up and stretched, bandaged arms twinging. After her morning exercises, she made her way down to the kitchen for breakfast. Tim and Steph were looking through the back pages of a newspaper, startled-worried-annoyed.

“What’s wrong?” Cass asked.

“Take a look,” said Tim, handing her the paper and pointing to a small article on page seven. The Wild Hearts casino, owned by the Midnight Crew (not that that was public knowledge) was remodeling and rebranding as…

“Four Aces?”

“A card-themed casino. In Gotham!” Steph threw her hands up in exasperation. “Do they not know or just not care?”

“Have we called Arkham?” Cass asked.

“Yeah, they’re upping their security. For all the good that ever does.” Steph sighed and shook her head.

“Just what we needed right now.” Tim groaned. Cass agreed.

The Joker had a tendency to jump in on these kinds of things, no matter how locked up he was.

\----------------

Your name is Spades Slick, and you are living it up right now. You’ve got casinos and smuggling operations and some new counterfeiting machines set up, and no one in this town is inclined to try and kick you out anymore. Well, Red Hood might be, but his turf is deep in the inner city, away from yours. You’re hauling back a safe full of stolen junk and the night is still young.

Black Mask has been put away thanks to those Bat-types, who snagged him before you could kill the fucker. Of course, between the lawyers and the judges in this town you don’t think he’ll be in there for long, but that’s fine by you. You can just try and kill him again when he gets out.

You’re starting to gain a little more respect for them Bats. They’re all real scrappy types. The spooky masked dame in particular knows her way around a brawl, and has a hell of a punch. You had a real vicious goddamn headache after getting hit by her. The big main guy is also a rough customer, and the little one is kind of fun. Angry little kid. You feel like he reminds you of someone.

Then again, apparently all of the bats have this thing about not killing people, so how threatening are they really? Honestly, you’d think no one in this town knew how to kill people anymore, what with some of the reactions you get. Take what happened the other day.

You were walking back from some quality carousing when some creepy guy with a knife accosted you in an alley, talking about how the world is fake or some other egghead bullshit. You don’t know how a guy who let himself get cut that many times was supposed to be intimidating to anybody, but whatever. Anyhow, you went ahead and added a bunch more cuts before he could try anything, and that was that. But when they found the body the next day, everyone was going on about how shocking it was that the guy had suddenly turned up dead. Apparently he had been a big deal because he was a serial killer or something. Same with that skeezy little guy you threw off of a balcony for fucking with your hats. He even had a nickname.

And you guess that was the problem. People in this town get so worked up over anyone with a gimmick. Hell, you went and remodeled your casino to have a nice card theme, and everyone was freaking out over some clown guy who isn’t even out on the streets who apparently causes trouble with that sort of thing. Like you’re going to pay any attention to that. Even if the guy apparently escaped just the other day. What’s he gonna do, try and blow up your casino?

You arrive back at your casino to find that the motherfucking clown guy just tried to blow it up. It’s also been defaced with a bunch of clown graffiti. It says ‘Don’t forget, the Joker is wild,’ among other things, including a truly obnoxious amount of ‘ha ha ha’s. It’s all in garish ugly shades of neon green and purple too. Someone shows you the security footage, and it looks like the fucker thinks he’s being real funny with his amateur punk bullshit. A joker’s not even a real playing card anyway. Wild cards are for babies. You play real card games. God you fucking hate clowns.

Droog’s already got a car pulled up and a bunch of weapons. Says he asked around and apparently this clown likes to hide in abandoned amusement parks and candy factories and other sickeningly thematic places. You don’t know how it’s supposed to be so hard to catch this guy if he always does that, but whatever. Deuce is looking over some maps and making a list of spots to check while Boxcars sits impatiently in the back. You jump in the car and take off. Time to paint the town red.

A whole lot of reckless driving, yelling, unnecessary mayhem, two candy factories, an abandoned toy factory, three abandoned amusement parks and an old circus later, you finally catch up with the Joker and his goons at an abandoned carnival. What the hell is wrong with this town? Why are there so many stupid whimsically grim places? When you’re done here you’re going to burn every last one of them down. But you’ve got stuff to do right now.

You and the boys burst into the gates and start with the killing. They don’t seem to have expected you to catch up with them so quickly. You shoot some guys, you stab some guys, Droog cracks a guy’s head open with a pool cue, Boxcars cuts a guy in half, the usual. The clown in charge comes running up to the top of the bandstand and making jokes at you. You ignore him. He doesn’t seem to like that, if the way he starts screaming angrily at you is any indication. Boxcars tries to take the stairs, but gets whacked over the head with a mallet by a dame in a jester outfit. That’s gonna keep him busy for a while. The Joker stops trying to get you to pay attention to his stupid clown act and turns to run. You can’t have that now, can you? You throw a knife and catch him in the arm as he moves to leave. It doesn’t stop him, but he’s trailing blood now. He yells at his goons to hold you off while he gets the escape vehicle, except it’s real obvious that he’s just going to scram all by himself. Everyone else must either be too scared or stupid to notice.

You get down to the business of getting rid of all of his guys so you can go after him. He’s got a lot of minions for a clown who does nothing but do stupid prank bullshit and murder people for no reason. You may not exactly be a pacifist, but when you kill someone it’s always for a perfectly good reason. Because they were trying to kill you, stealing from you, insulting you, cutting you in line at the buffet, that sort of thing. 

You tell Deuce to help Boxcars out with the jester girl, which he interprets as being that he should throw a bomb at them. It’s pretty dumb, but jester girl gets knocked out, so hey, whatever works. After that, the rest of his goons go down or wise up and run away pretty quick like. Time to go clown hunting.

You catch up with him in a garage towards the back of the park. There was a bucket of cement precariously balanced on top of the door to fall on anyone who tried to walk in, but it fell the wrong way. Joker is backing away from you, hands raised. As you pace towards him, he makes some quip about how you look so serious and don’t you want to stop and smell the roses, and then he squirts you with the flower on his lapel.

It is, of course, full of acid. You reel back, the side of your face burning. The Joker cackles and rushes you, knife out.

You break his face with your robot arm. What does he think you are, some kind of pansy who gets paralyzed by a little pain?

Even when he’s bloody on the floor, the clown keeps making jokes. He’s making one right now about how you must be more of a steak guy. Oh, it’s because your face is still sizzling from the acid, and the room smells like burning meat. This guy thinks he’s so funny. But that’s alright, you think as you lock the two of you in the room, because you’re about to be _hilarious_.

By which you mean you’re going to brutally murder him. You feel like that was kind of obvious, but you wanted to say it anyway.

\------------------

Duke kept his eyes peeled for any danger as he rode his motorcycle towards the old carnival near the edge of the city, the Batmobile and Tim’s bike behind him. They were all still pretty exhausted from earlier- they had checked out a cavern that Bruce had thought might be a hideout for the Joker thanks to some detection equipment that had been left there earlier, but it had been a trick, and the cavern had been filled with traps. When they had finally gotten out of that and checked the news back on the surface, they had seen the reports about how the Four Aces casino had been attacked by the Joker, and a mysterious band of gangsters was tearing up every potential Joker hideout in town in retaliation. Of course, being more in tune with the underworld than the press, Duke and the others knew that the mysterious band was actually the Midnight Crew, which was why they were all speeding towards the old carnival, where gunshots had been reported.

As they approached, Duke focused his eyes and peered through buildings to see the carnival’s front gate. There was a fight going on; the Midnight Crew minus Slick was backing out, chased by animated vines; Boxcars was carving his way out of the mouth of a giant Venus Flytrap. 

“It looks like Poison Ivy’s there.” Duke said over the communicator.

“Ivy?” Bruce asked.

“Either that or someone’s gotten ahold of some of her plants.”

“Why would Poison Ivy get mixed up in this?” Stephanie asked.

“Beats me. I’ll keep looking.”

Duke turned his attention back to the fight. As he watched, Slick darted into his field of view, slashing the stalk of the plant trying to eat Boxcars. Slick was covered in blood and had a bad burn on the side of his face, but he still seemed pretty cheerful. With his knives helping them out, the Midnight Crew managed to fight free of the plants and pile into their car, peeling away at breakneck speed.

“The Midnight Crew’s leaving the scene headed north on Byron Avenue.” Duke reported.

“We’ll deal with them later. We need to catch the Joker before anything else.” said Bruce.

The six of them pulled up to the gates. Duke activated his suit’s invisibility and pulled out a grapple.

“I’m going topside. I’ll start looking for Joker and cover you while you deal with those plants.” he said.

“Understood.” said Bruce. “Be careful, and watch for traps.”

They went into action. Duke ran carefully along the top of the fence and watched for trouble. The rest of them rushed through the front gate, ducking and slashing at vines with practiced ease. Poison Ivy was indeed their controller; she was sitting a little ways inside, helping a rather battered-looking and dazed Harley Quinn make her way towards the exit.

“Ivy! Where’s the Joker?” Bruce demanded.

“I don’t know and I don’t care. I came as soon as I heard about the fight, and I’m getting Harley out of here before he pulls her into any more nonsense.” Ivy glared at Bruce.

“Are you going to try and stop me?” she asked. Her vines reared up and tensed, and the very leaves and grass that were nearby seemed to tremble.

Bruce considered it for a moment.

“No.” he said. “Stay out of trouble.”

Ivy didn’t bother answering him as she gently arranged Harley on a seat of vines and rode away.

Where was the Joker? Or the rest of his men, for that matter? Duke looked around carefully. Wait, was that-

“The garage, 120 meters east.” he said over the comms, already moving. 

Everyone else crashed through the doors and windows at about the same time as him. And so it was that they all found the Joker’s body together.

The supervillain was a ruin, his trademark purple suit in blood-soaked tatters. His face was still recognizable, though; most of the stabbing had been done from the throat down. And it had been very thorough stabbing, too. 

“I guess that’s why Slick was covered in blood.” said Duke. It was a brutal scene, though after what had happened to his parents, he wasn’t about to feel sorry for the Joker.

“Yeah, no kidding.” said Steph.

“Are we sure it’s really him?” Tim asked.

“We’ll have to double check the DNA.” said Bruce, a little distantly.

“Sure looks like him, though. Kinda hard to believe that after everything he would just get killed by some guy.” Steph shook her head.

“Tch. Good riddance.” Damian probably spoke for most of the city there.

Bruce took a few samples off of the body to double check later. The sound of sirens started to get closer; the GCPD was arriving with its usual lateness.

“Let’s go.” said Bruce. “Check for traps to make sure no one gets hurt cleaning up the scene, and then we’re out of here.”

A few hours later, Duke got out of the showers at the Batcave, dressed, and walked out to see Steph, Cass, and Tim in the middle of a video call with Dick and Barbara.

“So he’s really dead?” Barbara was saying.

“As a doornail.” said Steph.

“DNA scans confirmed it was really him.” Tim added. “Bruce and Damian are keeping an eye on the body until the police finish up the legal business and have it cremated.”

Dick looked a little shocked.

“It’s weird.” he said. “Somehow it felt like he was never going to go away. Or that it would take some kind of epic final confrontation.”

“Well, I’m certainly not going to miss him.” said Barbara. “Oh, hello, Duke.”

“Hey. I guess you guys heard then.”

“Yeah. Sounds like you guys have been having an interesting time without us.”

“I’m sorry I can’t be there.” said Dick. “Unfortunately, Kori’s sister is being very stubborn about this whole affair.”

“Should I hurry back?” asked Barbara.

“No.” said Cass. “Enjoy your trip.”

“Yeah, we’ve got this.” said Steph.

“Though if you can find anything out about the Midnight Crew, that would be helpful.” Tim added.

“I looked as soon as I heard the news about a new gang in Gotham.” said Barbara. “But there’s just nothing. You’d expect some kind of trail, but there’s just absolutely nothing. It’s almost as if they just popped into existence from nowhere.”

If the one and only Oracle couldn’t find anything, there was nothing to be found. They were on their own, then.

Barbara glanced off to the side.

“I should probably get back to bed before Dinah steals all of the blankets. You guys should get some sleep too.”

“It’s still daylight here on Tamaran,” said Dick, “but she’s right. Talk to you guys later.”

The calls clicked off, and the four of them went off to sleep.

The next few days were interesting. The Joker’s autopsy and subsequent unremarkable cremation went off without a hitch. Bruce had claimed the ashes and had them vaporized entirely.

The city as a whole was about as happy as it had been in a long while. “The Joker is dead” was something they had heard before, but this time, with the solemn assurances of everyone from Batman and the mayor on down that he was really gone, the news that (unlike all the other times) the body had been found, and the leaked autopsy photos that wound up getting published in the tabloids, people had finally accepted that it was for real. It might still take a while to process from some of the people he had hurt, but it sure seemed like he wasn’t coming back this time.

That just left the Midnight Crew. Word had gotten around pretty quickly that apparently the leader of the new gang that had offed Sal Maroni and the Mad Hatter, Spades Slick, was the one who killed the Joker. (And considering his apparent predilection for knives, many were speculating that he might be responsible for Victor Zsasz turning up dead in an alley with thirty-seven stab wounds, too.) Killing the Joker was about the most impressive thing you could do to get credibility in Gotham short of killing Batman. It was another victory for the Midnight Crew, and it left Bruce sitting on edge about what they might be planning.

And then the Midnight Crew, with all their strange otherworldly tech and unique physiology and skills and massive reserves of liquid cash and credibility went ahead and did…

Nothing. Nothing but the same small-time stuff they were doing already. It was baffling. They kept looking and looking, but there was nothing. No death rays, no space portals, no grand schemes, nothing. Things in the city died down as the fallout from the recent super-fights settled. Soon they heard that the Red Hood had come to the loose arrangement of deals that constituted a gangland peace agreement with the Midnight Crew, and Bruce decided to go ask Jason about it.

Bruce, Duke, and Cass swung by Jason’s apartment later that day. Bruce was standing in the kitchen opposite Jason, while Duke looked around for anything that might be interesting or useful (there was nothing; Jason was as paranoid and crazy-prepared as the rest of them), and Cass passed the time by hacking the firing pins out of all of Jason’s guns with a batarang.

“You really think they’re not a problem?” Bruce asked.

“No more than anyone else in this city.” said Jason.

“Do you have any idea what they want, what their motivation is?”

Jason cocked his head thoughtfully. “Truth be told, Bruce, I think they just think being a gangster is fun.”

Bruce seemed a little taken aback at that. Duke thought about it as they took their leave of Jason’s apartment and swung away. Was that why Slick had gotten rid of all of the white collar crime? Did he just prefer a safe full of cash to abstract holdings?

“Thoughts?” Bruce asked the two of them as they went.

Duke pondered it a little more. 

“They should still be brought in.” he said. “But I don’t think they pose any special danger to anyone. Or at least, not to anyone who doesn’t piss them off.”

“They don’t seem to have the same kind of…” Cass paused to try and translate something that presumably came off better when you could read body language. “They’re not all twisted up like the really hurt people are.”

Bruce nodded. “All right. We’ll take them off the priority list and go back to normal operations.”

Well, that was a relief. 

“I’ll catch you all later.” said Duke. “Now that things are back to normal, I should get back to doing more daylight patrols.”

“Right. We’ll check in later.” 

Bruce and Cass turned away to get back to the Batmobile, while Duke kept going. It was a nice sunny day, the kind that Gotham didn’t get that often. The weight of the recent events finally felt like it had lifted, and it felt good to be on a good old-fashioned patrol again.

Almost on cue, there was a scream from a nearby alley. Two guys with knives trying to mug a young couple. Apparently some people still needed to learn that not all of the Bats in Gotham were nocturnal.

Duke dropped invisibly behind the pair and cleared his throat. And the looks on their faces as they whirled around in a panic, oh man. Anyone who said that this job didn’t have its rewards was a liar.

\---------------

Your name is Spades Slick, and you think things worked out alright in the end. Sure, you’re a little upset that you didn’t manage to get even with Lord English, but the fucked-up game couldn’t have picked a better place to drop you and the gang, and horribly murdering that clown for messing up your casino had scratched a bit of that revenge itch.

Speaking of which, apparently nobody liked that damn clown, judging by the reactions you’ve gotten after killing him. Even the Red Hood liked it enough that you managed to get some rules set up between the two of you. You’re not sure how nobody else managed to kill the clown, seeing as everyone hated him so much, but hey, more for you.

Your operations are all set up, you’ve got your crew, you’ve got the respect you deserve, and the Bat-types provide just enough challenge to keep things interesting. You’ve come to like this town. You think you’ll stick around.

**Author's Note:**

> Editing: 2 hours  
> Research: 1 hour  
> Writing: 10 hours  
> Obsessively checking to make sure that the second and third person POVs were in the right parts: 40 hours  
> Rereading: 1 hour  
> Someone who is good at the literature please help me budget this. My WIPs are dying.


End file.
